Silver Spring Networks files for an IPO of up to $150M

Smart grid company Silver Spring Networks has finally filed its long-awaited IPO, and could raise up to $150 million in a public offering on the New York Stock Exchange, according to its filing. Silver Spring Networks, which plans to use the symbol SSNI, sells wireless networking products to utilities for smart meter deployments and other smart grid services, and counts over a dozen utility clients.

Silver Spring has seen massive growth over the past several years. In 2010, Silver Spring Networks generated revenues of $70.22 million, up dramatically from $3.30 million in 2009 and just $58,000 in 2008. For the three months ending March 31, 2011, Silver Spring has already brought in $46.69 million.

At the same time, the company isn’t yet profitable, and lost $148.45 million in 2010, $113.46 million in 2009, and $40.39 million in 2008. In total, Silver Spring has accumulated a deficit of $401.8 million as of March 31, 2011.

At first glance, the thing that stands out to me in Silver Spring’s financials is just how long the actual sales cycle is to book revenue for the commercial deployment of smart grid gear. The company only generated $58,000 worth of revenue in 2008, yet had already signed up a decent amount of utility customers at that time, and was founded back in 2002.

This long period of deferring revenue is dependent on utility pilots, shipment schedules, rate of deployments of smart meters, consumer adoption, and supply of components. As a result of these factors, Silver Springs says it has $422.2 million in deferred revenue as of March 31, 2011.

This IPO has been a long time coming, and was expected in 2010. If the company does go public, it could give a much-needed boost to smart grid deployments, new smart grid companies, and VCs investing in smart grid innovation.

I’ll bring you more on the implications and details of this as I dig through the S-1.